This volume clearly demonstrates the diversity of our field. Twenty-two scholars have contributed thirteen unique pieces of research on a wide variety of topics including public management innovation; organizational learning; revenue forecasting; finance; qualitative research and research methods; intergovernmetnal relations; training and management information systems; bureaucratic responsibility; citizen participation; political influence of the bureaucracy; critiques of policy making; public administration research. This collection makes a rich contribution of knowledge to our field.

The study of urban governance provides a valuable insight into economic, social, and political forces and how they shape city life. But who and what are the real drivers of change? This innovative text casts new light on the issues and re-examines the state of urban governance at the start of the twenty-first century. Jon Pierre analyses four models of urban governance: 'management', 'corporatist', 'pro-growth' and 'welfare'. Each is assessed in terms of its implications for the major issues, interests and challenges in the contemporary urban arena. Distinctively, Pierre argues that institutions - and the values which underpin them - are the driving forces of change. The book also assesses the impact of globalization upon urban governance. The long-standing debate on the decline of urban governance is re-examined and reformulated by Pierre, who applies a wider international approach to the issues. He argues that the changing cast of private and public actors, combined with new forms of political participation, have resulted in a transformation - rather than a decline - of contemporary urban governance.

As places face increased competition for human and capital resources, public managers turn toward corporate-like governance strategies and branding practices to shape places and organizations. However, for better or worse, these organizations begin to resemble highly competitive, private-sector public relations and marketing firms. Place branding is taking hold within many organizations, including city governments, yet very few scholars take a public administration approach when exploring the causes and effects of branding practices. In Place Branding through Phases of the Image, Zavattaro explains how city promotional strategies can take the place of corporate governance structures through phases of the image. She examines how city government entities are undertaking place branding practices, with the realization that relying too much on image rather than a balance between image and substance has serious implications for democratic, collaborative governance. This book creates a workable framework that simultaneously serves as a cautionary tale for building a promotional campaign focused exclusively on image.

This biography, the first of Richard Spencer Childs, begins in the Progressive Era when Childs initiated and pursued two fertile ideas: the short ballot doctrine and the council-manager plan. Childs understood that the simplification of the task of the voter was a question pressing for solution and that the council-manager plan would transform municipal government. This comprehensive work discusses other aspects of Childs' broad reform agenda. His proposals included: county government reform; reform in state government administration; unicameral state legislatures; reapportionment of state legislatures; selection of judges by appointment; replacement of elective county coroners with appointed professional medical examiners; democratization of state political parties; and reform of the Presidential nominating system. Based on Childs' papers and personal interviews with Childs, this biography advances scholarship on the Progressive Era and contributes to the historiographical debate on the nature of reform.

Privatization of government services in the United States has accelerated in the last two decades, especially at the state and local levels. This work focuses on contracting out--the most widely used method of privatization. Contributors from academia, consulting firms, government agencies, and private providers discuss the why and how of contracting out and examine the results of contracted services, including quality and cost measures of performance. Some chapters apply economic theory to contracting out. Others examine recent case studies of contracting out initiatives.

The book begins with a thoughtful essay on the theory of privatization and examines the recent record of use in state and local governments. Section 1 takes an overview look at contracting out. Section 2 examines contracting in the criminal justice area as well as examples of contracting in such diverse areas as trash collection and the operation of golf courses. The final section looks in depth at the mechanics, obstacles, and effects of contracting. The book points out the pluses and minuses of contracting out and points to the lessons that can be learned from the recent history of this privatization technique.

This text evaluates the validity of a key proposition of public choice theory: that competition is associated with superior performance by governmental organizations. Three forms of competition in local government are identified: competition between local authorities; competition between councils and private contractors; and competition between parties for political power. The extent and consequences of competition are assessed in both the UK and USA. The analysis is used to draw conclusions on the effects of competition and the validity of public choice theory.

Under pressure from both the Federal government and private citizens, local and state governments are restructuring their services, including the areas of education, highway, and transportation. While the federal government wants to reassign responsibilities to local governments, voters want greater efficiency and lower taxes via privatization. This edited collection considers these pressures, the responses from state and local governments, and specific experiments in privatizing local services.

The book's opening chapter presents an overview of the changing landscape, while the following chapters consider possibilities in both education and highway services. In education, interdistrict school choice and state-local structures are considered. Highway services are seen in federal-state and state-private relationships. Reporting on a variety of experiments, each chapter illustrates a type of service or arrangement for restructuring governmental services.

In 1787, the new United States of America formulated a Constitution, which for more than two hundred years has remained the greatest single advance in the long evolution of democracy and freedom. The authors of the Constitution, fearing the religious intolerance and persecution that was typical of many European governments, deliberately avoided a church-state union and limited the federal government to purely secular matters. The First Amendment explicitly stated, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; ..". In the debate over the separation between church and state, attention is often focussed solely on the national Constitution. The fact is sometimes overlooked that the state constitutions, some of which were written before the federal Constitution, include explicit protections of religious liberty and church-state separation, some even more comprehensive and specific in their guarantees and prohibitions than the U.S. Constitution. All of the state constitutions deal with religious freedom and all support the church-state separation principle. Forty-six states explicitly protect freedom of worship or conscience, while thirty-five states prohibit establishment of any state religion. Interestingly, five states still have provisions requiring that office holders believe in a Supreme Being, despite the fact that the Supreme Court declared these requirements to be unconstitutional in 1961. This comprehensive volume brings together all of the religious-liberty and church-state provisions of the fifty state constitutions. The only work of its kind, Religious Liberty and State Constitutions will serve as a useful referencework for people in the fields of education, law, and religion.

Written by a team of leading experts, "The Palgrave Review of British Politics 2006" provides up-to-date coverage of developments in British government and politics. An indispensable reference book, it covers the entire political year and includes chapters on the constitution, government and administration, the law, Parliament, public policy, devolution, foreign policy, relations with the EU, local government, elections and public opinion, the party system, pressure politics, the media and democracy, plus a statistical appendix.

J. Phillip Thompson III, an insider in the Dinkins administration, provides the first in-depth look at how the black mayors of America's major cities achieve social change. Black constituents naturally look to black mayors to effect great change for the poor, but the reality of the situation
is complicated. Thompson argues that African-American mayors, legislators, and political activists need to more effectively challenge opinions and public policies supported by the white public and encourage greater political inclusion and open political discourse within black communities. Only by
unveiling painful internal oppresssions and exclusions within black politics will the black community's power increase, and compel similar unveilings in the broader interracial conversation about the problems of the urban poor. Tracing the historical development and contemporary practice of black
mayoral politics, this is a fascinating study of the motivations of black politicians, competing ideologies in the black community and the inner dynamics of urban social change.

Please note this is a 'Palgrave to Order' title (PTO). Stock of this book requires shipment from an overseas supplier. It will be delivered to you within 12 weeks. This book is a study of why people approve and disapprove of the mayor in four cities with long histories of racial conflict: New Orleans, Detroit, Chicago and Charlotte NC. It examines the relative influence of race, racial factors, racial environment, and perceptions of the quality of life in determining mayoral approval.

Nation states around the globe are increasingly raising the 'federalism' card as a means of explaining their commitment to democracy, self-determination, and recognition of the rights of all peoples. Yet, the term federalism does not convey the same set of institutions, values and beliefs to all people at all times. This collection of essays is designed to help scholars and practitioners understand the fluid and dynamic nature of federalism, with particular emphasis on the federal system in the United States. The book is written to aid our understanding of the contemporary question 'which federalism?'

Koven examines how political philosophy shapes public policy. In particular, he emphasizes the influence of ideology on one policy area--budgeting in the public sector. That political beliefs greatly affect the type of policy implemented appears obvious, as would the benefit of rational--not ideological--policymaking. Yet, the question of whether policy is developed by politically biased appointees or by neutral administrators is not so easily answered. Koven asserts that government policy determined by philosophical factors directly contradicts the view that public policy should be developed by policy experts via rational analysis. He concludes that through the recognition and control of confounding influences, objective policy can--and should--be formulated.

Technological innovation, the globalization of exchange, greater marital instability, and new environmental and health challenges are reshaping the world in which we live. This edited volume analyzes current and projected future socioeconomic trends in the context of New York State, a state that has historically played an important role in public policy innovation. The contributors identify major trends, compare New York State to the United States as a whole, and indicate the need for new social policy at the local, state, and federal levels. Among the issues discussed are the distribution of income, trends in land use, recent immigrants, and family living arrangements.

In their tenth co-authored study, Brennan and Hahn propose both a new method of biographical study for students of political communication and a new way of evaluating candidates for presidential office. The authors argue that given the biases inherent in the print and broadcast media, the only way to obtain accurate assessment about presidential candidates is to analyze information from the primary sources--the candidates themselves. They show how careful listening and rigorous analysis can enable the reader to extract reliable clues to presidential competence from the speeches, debates, press conferences, and advertising spots of the candidates. Challenging traditional rhetorical criticism in which biography is used to help evaluate speeches, Brennan and Hahn demonstrate that speeches can be effectively used to arrive at reliable evaluations of speakers. In order to establish the need for a new approach, the authors begin with a critique of the major extant methods of political analysis (biography, psychobiography, political biography and rhetorical biography). They then respond to that need by focusing on methods of analyzing information directly from political speeches and other utterances, identifying five major arenas for evaluating candidates: personality orientation, leadership ideal, ideology, epistemology, and axiology. Each of the arenas is divided into theory and application sections, providing the reader with both the methods in practice and an understanding of why they work. The final chapter examines the relationship of the media to political analysis. A comprehensive bibliography completes the work.

Although difficult, complicated, and sometimes discouraging, collaboration is recognized as a viable approach for addressing uncertain, complex and wicked problems. Collaborations can attract resources, increase efficiency, and facilitate visions of mutual benefit that can ignite common desires of partners to work across and within sectors. An important question remains: How to enable successful collaboration? Inter-Organizational Collaboration by Design examines how these types of collaborations can overcome barriers to innovate and rejuvenate communities outlining the factors and antecedents that influence successful collaboration. The book proposes a theoretical perspective for collaborators to adopt design science (a solution finding approach utilizing end-user-centered research, prototyping, and collective creativity to strengthen individuals, teams, and organizations), the language of designers, and a design attitude as an empirically informed pathway for better managing the complexities inherent in collaboration. Through an integrated framework, evidence-based tools and strategies for building successful collaboration is articulated where successful collaboration performance facilitates innovation and rejuvenation. This volume will be essential reading for academics, researchers, leaders and managers in nonprofit, private, and government sectors interested in building better collaborations.

"Redesigning the Work of Human Services" explores alternative organizational designs for the delivery of human services--designs that emphasize collaborative governance and partnerships among public and private agencies, local control and responsibility for results, and the use of innovative information, planning, and community capacity-building technologies. This book redefines the debate about whether human services should be privatized or not. The author suggests that the basic task of human services--to enable families to socialize the young--is one that can neither be fulfilled effectively by the state nor by private agencies. Rather, carefully crafted public-private partnerships, when combined with new accountability mechanisms and the sophisticated use of emerging information technologies, are likely to offer more in the way of effective, efficient, and appropriate human services. Because this work is solidly grounded in the literature on both human and business services, the author's suggestions for major redesign are comprehensive and intelligently qualified.

What is the current state of local government in Britain and where is it going? Edited by two leading experts and with an all-star cast of contributors, British Local Government into the 21st Century brings together a set of specially-commissioned and tightly-edited chapters to provide a comprehensive assessment of the issues and challenges facing local authorities as they search for a new role in a new century.

This book provides up-to-date coverage of developments in British government and politics written by a team of leading experts. An indispensable reference book, it covers the entire political year and includes chapters on the constitution, government and administration, the law, Parliament, public policy, devolution, foreign policy, relations with the EU, local government, elections and public opinion, the party system, pressure politics, the media and democracy, plus a statistical appendix.

During the 1990s, the structure of local government in Scotland and Wales was completely reorganised by Acts of Parliament. Under other legislation, and in response to recommendations from the Local Government Commission, there was a partial reorganisation in shire England. This is the only study which examines these reforms in one volume. Running through this study is the contrast between the rhetoric used to justify replacing counties and districts by new unitary authorities and the realities of local government. The book reviews the reasons for the reforms, the processes and outcomes in the three countries, and the nature of the evidence which was available for the advantages and disadvantages of reorganisation. Two chapters compare the prior assessments with the actuality, and the final chapter discusses some important lessons for national governance. This is the only study written by someone who was directly involved in the structural review, as a member of the Local Government Commission, and it combines this special experience with a wealth of information from many sources. The book will be a key text for teachers and students of local government and also important for those studying public administration, government and politics at the second or third year undergraduate level. There should also be a wide readership in local government circles and among MPs and those concerned with public life. -- .

In January 2014, for the first time in the history of federal farm legislation going back to the Great Depression, all four members of the US House of Representatives from Kansas voted against the Farm Bill, despite pleas by the states agricultural leaders to support it. Why? The story of the Agricultural Act of 2014, as it unfolds in Framing the Farm Bill, has much to tell us about the complex nature of farm legislation, food policy, and partisan politics in present-day America. Framing the Farm Bill is an enlightening look at federal agricultural policy-its workings, its history, and its present state-as well as the effect federal legislation has on farming practices, the environment, and our diet, in a thoroughly readable primer on the politics of food in America.

Most African economies range from moderately advanced capitalist systems with modern banks and stock markets to peasant and pastoral subsistent systems. Most African countries are also characterized by parallel institutions of governance – one is the state sanctioned (formal) system and the other is the traditional system, which is adhered to, primarily but not exclusively, by the segments of the population in the subsistence peasant and pastoral economic systems.

Traditional Institutions in Contemporary African Governance examines critical issues that are largely neglected in the literature, including why traditional institutions have remained entrenched, what the socioeconomic implications of fragmented institutional systems are, and whether they facilitate or impede democratization. The contributors investigate the organizational structure of traditional leadership, the level of adherence of the traditional systems, how dispute resolution, decision-making, and resource allocation are conducted in the traditional system, gender relations in the traditional system, and how the traditional institutions interact with the formal institutions.

Filling a conspicuous gap in the literature on African governance, this book will be of great interest to policy makers as well as students and scholars of African politics, political economy and democratization.

Table of Contents

1. Institutional Fragmentation in Africa and its implications

2. Leadership Structures and Adherence Levels of Traditional Institutions

3. Traditional Institutions of Governance in a democratic South Africa

4. Traditional Institutions of the Booranaa and the Nuer in Ethiopia

5. Traditional Institutions in Somaliland

6. Traditional Institutions of the Gurage People

7. Traditional Institutions of the Meru, Pokot, and Mijikenda Communities in Kenya

8. Eritrea’s Experience in Reconciling the Formal and Traditional Institutions in Its judicial system

9. The relevance of Lesotho’s chieftainship system to contemporary governance

10. "Civil Chieftaincy" in African Governance

11. Relevance of Traditional Institutions and How they might be Reconciled with the Formal Institutions

12. Conclusion: Lessons Learned and Policy Implications

Local governments encounter mammouth problems, and although there is not one panacea that works internationally, this book argues that there are mechanisms to improve the local situation and theer is evidence that this can suceed. By considering a number of key case studies from Latin America, Africa and Asia, the authors review best practices in good governance, thereby demonstarting that things can improve at the local level.

The small unpopulated islands in the East China Sea that the Chinese call the Diaoyu and the Japanese call the Senkaku, have long been a source of contention. This volume will undertake an examination of the controversy as it plays out in legacy and new social media in China, Japan, and the West.